SOPA/PIPA Draw Big Opposition

Members of the House and Senate are looking to put the brakes on new Internet anti-piracy legislation that may do more harm than good. The Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) bill in the House, and its Senate companion, the Protect Intellectual Property Act (PIPA), were drawn up to prevent the theft of intellectual property over the web by foreign entities. Both bills have strong backing from Hollywood and other media companies, but there is growing concern that they go too far in enforcing their mandate.

The legislation would give the government unchecked power to shut down domestic websites alleged to have committed or even enabled online piracy. The ability to illegally distribute someone else’s content over the web is a genuine problem, but this legislation would change copyright law so as to hold websites accountable for third-party content posted on their sites through comment forums and the like. Think Facebook or YouTube, and you can understand that these bills are a solution worse than the problem.

In the face of widespread Internet backlash – numerous websites “blacked out” Wednesday in protest – several senators did an about-face. So far this week, 16 Republicans and two Democrats, including seven co-sponsors, announced new opposition. Even the Obama administration expressed reservations.

"How prone all human institutions have been to decay; how subject the best-formed and most wisely organized governments have been to lose their check and totally dissolve; how difficult it has been for mankind, in all ages and countries, to preserve their dearest rights and best privileges, impelled as it were by an irresistible fate of despotism." —James Monroe, speech in the Virginia Ratifying Convention, 1788